Worst US Economic Contraction In Quarter Century By Peter Symondswww.countercurrents.org/symond310109.htm
More grim figures released by the US Commerce Department yesterday provide further confirmation of the severity of the economic contraction in the US and globally. The US economy shrank at an annualised rate of 3.8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008&#8212;its worst result since 1982. The decline followed a contraction of 0.5 percent in the third quarter&#8212;the first successive quarterly GDP declines since 1990-91

The American Economy Is Not Coming Back By Dave Lindorffwww.countercurrents.org/lindorff310109.htm
What we are now seeing is the beginning of an inevitable downward adjustment in American living standards to conform with our actual place in the world. We are headed to a recovery that will not feel like a recovery at all. Eventually, productive capacity will be restored, as lowered US wages make it again profitable for some things to be made here at home again, but like people in the 1930s looking back at the Roaring 20s of yore, we are going to look back at the last two decades as some kind of dream

Manichean Echoes: Terrorists As Sub-Human By Binu Karunakaranwww.countercurrents.org/karun310109.htm
The opinion expressed recently by one of the senior judges in the Supreme Court of India, shows that the judiciary too has started to feel the pressure imposed by politicians who feed the rhetoric on terror as a means to garner votes and a society that feels terrorised in the absence of security. Such thoughts render the concept of fair trial invalid. The fact that such a statement came from top echelons of our judiciary means that list of worries of India’s civil society is a growing list

Gaza: Every Family Has A Story, Here Are Some Of Them By Eva Bartlettwww.countercurrents.org/bartlett310109.htm
There are many stories. Each account — each murdered individual, each wounded person, each burned-out and broken house, each shattered window, trashed kitchen, strewn item of clothing, bedroom turned upside down, bullet and shelling hole in walls, offensive Israeli army graffiti — is important

War On Gaza: Israeli Action, Not Reaction By Nicola Nasserwww.countercurrents.org/nasser310109.htm
In historical perspective, nothing proves the Israeli action and the Palestinian reaction more than the very existence of Hamas. While founding the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was the reaction of the Palestinian refugees in exile to the Israeli action of forcing them out of their homeland in 1948, the founding of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) in Gaza was the Palestinian reaction to the Israeli military expansion in 1967, which led to the occupation of the rest of historic Palestine

Israel And Hamas Won, So Who Lost? By Yacov Ben Efratwww.countercurrents.org/efrat310109.htm
Israel may have won in Gaza, but the centrist Kedima party, as well as Labor, have shot themselves in the foot. The other big loser is the people of Israel, intoxicated with victory. But the greatest loser in this war ofcourse is the Palestinian people

Tax Solution To Wretched Greed By Joel S. Hirschhornwww.countercurrents.org/joel310109.htm
Here is the solution that the overwhelming majority of Americans should demand: A law should be immediately passed that imposes a new special federal income tax of 99 percent on all income in excess of $500,000 annually for single taxpayers and $1 million for couples, starting for 2008 income. Call it a greed tax. Call it justice. Call it getting even for too many years of uncontrolled greed that has given the nation nothing but economic injustice and inequality, and given capitalism a very bad name. Call it a sensible way to raise federal revenues to help offset the cancerous national debt

Nests In Hell By Rand Cliffordwww.countercurrents.org/clifford310109.htm
So what might the New World Order show us? Simply, absolute control of land, sea, space, cyberspace, resources and people by the same elite now grappling with messiness of such as sovereign nations and human rights. They smell the goal line&#8212;those who profit from all dimensions of war and destruction; who profit from mangling the biosphere with fossil fuels; who profit from cashing out any hope of a non-reptilian future for humanity; who profit on extinction…those to whom profit, power and control are what life is about. Humanity slashed and burned down to under a billion slaves lorded over by a crust of reptilian supremacy…

Eradicating Terrorism: Groping In The Dark By Ram Puniyaniwww.countercurrents.org/puniyani310109.htm
While draconian laws are no solution to the problem, it is likely they create and intensify the problem. The mantra of &#8216;tighten the security&#8217; has not yielded any success in preventing it. The core point is to see that the concerned civic society makes its stand clear, that terrorism&#8217;s roots lie in injustice on one hand and US policies on the other. We need to raise our voices against injustice and US hegemony both to see that over a period of time the terror menace is eliminated by and by